Total recall is such hair - raising stuff

Hollywood insiders hold many secrets. One of the most perplexing is how they achieve perpetual six-day growth on their cheeks.

The Prince assumed the hair was snap-frozen. Or perhaps it is just one beard that
Brad Pitt
grew years ago and keeps handing around. But
Paul Hogan
’s Hollywood lawyer, former Melbourne boy
Craig Emmanuel
, is the full haircut.

In Federal Court in Sydney this past week, Emmanuel showed he has a razor-sharp mind enveloped in a disarming geniality that allowed him to agree with almost everything put to him in cross examination by
John Sheahan
, SC, rephrasing the question in each case so that it meant something a little different.

Emmanuel says profit-sharing on Hollywood films is based on an “honesty" policy, that participation statements by studios may or may not be accurate, and that the surest guide for copyright holders about how the film is faring is anecdotal evidence.

Emmanuel was testifying in a case in which the Australian Crime Commission is challenging legal privilege claims made by
Tony Stewart
, accountant for Hogan and his partner
John Cornell
.

Stewart had the embarrassment of signing a statement in July, then an affidavit last month, in which he said 19 times that he was acting on behalf of Cornell in emailing instructions to a law firm in Malta about a Malta company, Hornbeam Holdings.

In the past week Stewart realised he had made a terrible mistake. In fact Cornell never had anything to do with Hornbeam. Stewart couldn’t explain how he had made this mix-up but it must have been disappointing for Cornell – Hornbeam made a $180 million profit on a German IPO.

As embarrassing court moments go, it was up with News Ltd counsel
Ian Philip
’s recollection, on the day he was to testify in the C7 case, that a fax he sent to
Telstra
’s former counsel,
Bruce Akhurst
, which seemed to try to stitch up the
Seven Network
’s bid for AFL rights, was actually trying to stitch up Telstra. Stewart’s barrister,
Noel Hutley
, SC, also represented Philip. His mortification can only be imagined.